Hatboxes
by Punzie the Platypus
Summary: There was one night and two encounters that were fuzzy to Donna. She was out hat shopping at a little shop called Henrik's, and a man told her to run. Run, for the place was going to blow. When she asked for his name, all she got was, "I'm the Doctor." She somehow remembered him, but didn't.


**DISCLAIMER: I do NOT own Doctor Who. OH YAY my first Doctor Who story!**

Donna scoffed as she looked through another hatbox. There was too many and the shop was going to close soon. She didn't want to be late or her mum would be scowling and rambling to her again. Like she wanted to come home to that.

All she wanted was a stupid hat, was that so much to ask for? Her mum said she already had too many hats, that there wasn't enough room for more hats, that she spent too much money on hats. That was probably the reason she was looking for one. She had just been at a job interview and she had spoken too fast and had spilled a coffee on who could have been her future boss and she wasn't too happy about it overall.

So here she was, standing by the hat rack of a shop that was going to close any minute. She had had found one hat that didn't have a tag, and had called for a employee to come over and see if she could figure out the price. The blonde teen had run off somewhere, and Donna hadn't seen her since.

The rest of the shop was deserted, leaving her as the only customer left. She was getting annoyed as she stacked up hatboxes.

"There is absolutely bloody nothing!" she said crossly. She turned from the stack of hatboxes on the floor to the rack again and nearly got startled out of her skin. A man was behind the rack, with closely shaven hair and some sort of leather jacket.

"Hey, that one looks fine," he said, pointing to one she had just looked at.

"I don't want that one," Donna said defensively, not sure why the stranger was recommending a hat to her.

"No, believe me, looks fantastic on you, go with that one," the stranger said.

"No," Donna said.

"All right, fine. You leave the shop WITH or WITHOUT one," the stranger said. He pointed to the exit and with a quick smile, said, "You need to go."

"The shop doesn't close for another four minutes. I HAVE time," Donna said dismissively, scoffing as she turned to the other hats on the rack.

"No, you don't," the stranger said quickly, leaning over the rack, "you need to GET OUT."

"Why?" Donna said, straightening, making him straighten as well. "Why should I leave?"

"The building's going to blow. Up in flames. It's going to be GONE," the stranger said.

"How do you know that?" Donna asked, sounding somewhat incredulous and alarmed.

"I know because I'm going to blow it up," the stranger said with a quick smile before he pointed to the hatbox and said, "just go with that one, 'kay?"

"You're-you're going to BLOW UP THE SHOP?" Donna asked, sounding briskly annoyed.

"That was the plan," the man said before he quickly started away.

Donna could barely she could yell was, "Oi, you!"

"What?" he said, spinning around. "Come on, keep it quick."

"Who are you?" she asked.

The man didn't miss a beat as he said excitedly, "I'm the Doctor." He hurried away, and Donna watched him until he disappeared. She shook her head and turning back to the hatboxes, said, "Nutter." She had to choose a hat, though, before the store closed, and so, letting out a breath, she said, "All right, fine," and picked up the hat he had recommended. She hurried it to the register, feeling a bit in a hurry, and it was not just because of the shop closing.

She was rather alarmed when her mum brought up absentmindedly that morning that Henrik's had been blown up last night.

* * *

There was one fleeting moment on her wedding day when Donna felt like she knew the strange man whose strange box she had landed in somehow, like she had somehow met him before but she couldn't really remember him. She still didn't have the jest of it all, but she felt like she knew him as they sat on the edge of the roof together, looking out over a Christmas shopping London. The jacket on her shoulders was not leather, but it felt quite familiar, as if she had seen him before.

He mentioned he was the Doctor. He didn't look like the man who had warned her about the bomb a couple of years back. Matter of fact, this quiet, quirky Doctor didn't even look like he could light a bomb. So Donna kept nodding and listened to him, knowing that he wasn't the Doctor who had warned her to run.

* * *

Donna was rummaging through her hatboxes one morning. She was going to get married, and was preparing her stuff for moving. Her hatboxes were the first thing she was starting on that morning.

She began to stack them, knowing that they were all in good shape and wouldn't get damaged if she didn't pack them in boxes. She created a large stack, and suddenly one in her hands stayed there, and she looked at it like she had something about it she didn't remember.

She tossed it around in her hands, saying to herself, "What?" It felt like there was something to do with that box that she couldn't remember. She suddenly remembered.

"Oh, I got this the night before Henrik's exploded. That was YEARS ago," Donna said, putting it on one of the stacks. She went back to work, but couldn't help but look back at it, as if there was something more to the memory. There was a flash of leather and suddenly she realized that she had a headache. Putting a hand to her forehead, she shook her head and hurried downstairs, not sure what was with that particular hat.

**DONNA. NO. AHHHHHHHHHHHH. Yes, a small fic, but, you know. Yeah. I have a couple of more coming up soon. I hope you liked it, and thank you for reading!**


End file.
